Thank you very much! The rebuild seemed to go very well on a WD20EURS drive, (expanded and then supersized with jmfs tools). But, I'm stuck on acquiring channel information in that the Tivo can't. No Live TV at all. Have tried re-pairing the cable card with Comcast. Then did a Tivo clear and delete everything. Then a re-pair card with Comcast again. Repeat Guided setup (many times actually) Tivo says the lack of a "Auth: S" on the Conditional Access cable card info screen seems to indicate a cable card issue. Tell comcast to do a complete clear and delete, and then re-pair again. Asked comcast to do that. Not positive they did as they seem to really stick to canned script. They did disable and re-pair and all indications were the re-pair commands were good. allowed another hour or so for all updated, still no channels, restarted tivo and did yet another repeat guided setup. Still no luck. Any ideas?

It is a pairing issue with the cable company. It seems like all cable companies have the same issue. Most of the time you need to go to a higher tiered support as it requires a delete of the previous pairing before it can be repaired. When they pair they need the serial number, data id, and host id. If they don't ask for all three they do not know what they are doing. Either get them to get someone else or hang up and call back. Once that is done, they need to get the correct channel map assigned to the card so you can get all your channels.
Many times all they try to do is send hits to the card to "re pair" the card. When it does not work they want to send a truck out.

__________________
"Delay is preferable to error" - Thomas Jefferson
"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants" - Sir Isaac Newton

Thank you very much! The rebuild seemed to go very well on a WD20EURS drive, (expanded and then supersized with jmfs tools). But, I'm stuck on acquiring channel information in that the Tivo can't. No Live TV at all. Have tried re-pairing the cable card with Comcast. Then did a Tivo clear and delete everything. Then a re-pair card with Comcast again. Repeat Guided setup (many times actually) Tivo says the lack of a "Auth: S" on the Conditional Access cable card info screen seems to indicate a cable card issue. Tell comcast to do a complete clear and delete, and then re-pair again. Asked comcast to do that. Not positive they did as they seem to really stick to canned script. They did disable and re-pair and all indications were the re-pair commands were good. allowed another hour or so for all updated, still no channels, restarted tivo and did yet another repeat guided setup. Still no luck. Any ideas?

Try removing the cablecard, leaving it out, and selecting the lineup you'd get without it, preferentially by repeating guided setup. If no joy, try leaving the card out, disconnect the cable input as well, and say antenna ONLY, even if you don't have one. If on the latter, you get hung-up on the same spot, it's NOT your cableco - it's the TiVo, the image, or the drive. If the former works, then it's indicative of the cablecard.

Please report back on exactly what happens, so I can try to advise on further possibilities or things to try.

It is a pairing issue with the cable company. It seems like all cable companies have the same issue. Most of the time you need to go to a higher tiered support as it requires a delete of the previous pairing before it can be repaired. When they pair they need the serial number, data id, and host id. If they don't ask for all three they do not know what they are doing. Either get them to get someone else or hang up and call back. Once that is done, they need to get the correct channel map assigned to the card so you can get all your channels.
Many times all they try to do is send hits to the card to "re pair" the card. When it does not work they want to send a truck out.

This was posted as I was typing up my own reply. It's true. The cablecos have many ways they can go about working with the cablecards. They are trained to spend the least time on the phone, by doing to least amount of work. So they'll often leave data in, rather than take it ALL out and then put it all back in again.

I often ask them to unpair (or if I have already tried that, I ask for full deletion from the account), then INSIST they leave the system in that state, pull the card out, wait a few minutes, re-insert, then have them re-pair, or re-enter all the data.

They hate doing this, because it takes time for the TiVo to receive the updates for all the cablecard tables, due to it being in one-way mode, which puts it into "slow boot mode" (the cablecard itself).

Once you have tried every way, make sure to ask them to send some "EMMs" to your card. After a re-pair, I always ask them to "chase it with some EMMs (sometimes called "addressable hits"). If they do not register under EMMs received, in the CableCard screens (NOT the same as the DVR Diags Screen), there is a problem with its communications from the cableco.

Thank you both. O.k. I took the cable card out, then took a digital converter box from another room and put it between the cable and the tivo and repeated guided setup. When done, I could finally see some live t.v. on the TIVO. So...hopefully that means the rebuilt drive is good and it's the cable card. th Now, If I can just get them to fix it without a truck roll. (Yes they suggested that in an earlier call.) I'll try to convince them again to start from scratch remotely.

Thank you both. O.k. I took the cable card out, then took a digital converter box from another room and put it between the cable and the tivo and repeated guided setup. When done, I could finally see some live t.v. on the TIVO. So...hopefully that means the rebuilt drive is good and it's the cable card. th Now, If I can just get them to fix it without a truck roll. (Yes they suggested that in an earlier call.) I'll try to convince them again to start from scratch remotely.

In my experience (although my provider is Cox), it's been, if at first they don't succeed, they'll aggressively insist on a truck roll. You need to be just as aggressive in saying there's no need, without any proof the cablecard is defective.

I've spent hours on the phone with one rep, just to hang-up, call back, and have the next rep fix the problem in five minutes. It's usually the mangers or supervisors that tell the rep to roll a truck, just to get you off the phone.

With Cox, if they so much as see a splitter, or ANY piece of equipment, that isn't right off one of their trucks, ANYWHERE in sight, or realize it's a TiVo, they'll falsely blame your equipment, then bill you for the truck roll.

Ever since the FCC laid down the law with CableCards, I've NEVER once required a truck roll. I just needed the right person on the other end of the phone. Sometimes it took waiting for a shift change, and a fresh ear and rested mind, to get the matter resolved.

Sill trying to get this going. One thing I just noticed in comparing my HD Tivo (working) and the Premiere I just rebuilt is that the HD says Tuning Adapter: Not available. Whereas the Premiere says: Switched Digital Video: Tuning Adapter. I do not have a tuning adapter. Any chance this was a setting from the rebuild image that is retained (even though I did a clear and delete command in Tivo?) I've been poking around other posts that led me down this path.

As an update, I failed to get them to fix over the phone although after a couple attempts I did get someone to clear and rebuild from scratch (and I removed the card for a few minutes as suggested, then rebuild.) Still no good. (FYI, first Comcast rep said, we can't delete anything remotely. Second one said sure, I'll delete it.) Anyway, truck roll was suggested, but it was a long ways out so...I decided to pop over to Service office and get a new card, thinking that would force a real rebuild. But even with new card, same problem trying to acquire channels. That's my update.

any clue on Tuner. Does the above mean Tivo thinks I should have one? And if so, how can I get rid of that. Or am I way off.

If I need to get out of this post, just let me know. Thanks again for all the help.

Sill trying to get this going. One thing I just noticed in comparing my HD Tivo (working) and the Premiere I just rebuilt is that the HD says Tuning Adapter: Not available. Whereas the Premiere says: Switched Digital Video: Tuning Adapter. I do not have a tuning adapter. Any chance this was a setting from the rebuild image that is retained (even though I did a clear and delete command in Tivo?) I've been poking around other posts that led me down this path.

As an update, I failed to get them to fix over the phone although after a couple attempts I did get someone to clear and rebuild from scratch (and I removed the card for a few minutes as suggested, then rebuild.) Still no good. (FYI, first Comcast rep said, we can't delete anything remotely. Second one said sure, I'll delete it.) Anyway, truck roll was suggested, but it was a long ways out so...I decided to pop over to Service office and get a new card, thinking that would force a real rebuild. But even with new card, same problem trying to acquire channels. That's my update.

any clue on Tuner. Does the above mean Tivo thinks I should have one? And if so, how can I get rid of that. Or am I way off.

If I need to get out of this post, just let me know. Thanks again for all the help.

Go into the diagnostic area and run the tuning adapter diagnostic and see what happens.

I have a TA with my TiVo Premiere XL. If I unplug the TA I lose my SDV but can see other channels that don't require it. (usually ones under 100)

The acquiring channel map message is a CableCARD message. It can take awhile to download the map. Need to make sure your working CableCARD and non working have the same map. I cannot see why they wouldn't. Stranger things have happened.

If you haven't yet, disconnect the good unit from the cable drop and hook up the unit you are working on. Start it up and see if you have the same problem. Sometimes splitters in the circuit can cause problems especially older ones that don't have a broad enough frequency range.

__________________
"Delay is preferable to error" - Thomas Jefferson
"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants" - Sir Isaac Newton

If I need to get out of this post, just let me know. Thanks again for all the help.

While I'd like to keep trying to help, those of us that have been helping, have pretty thoroughly cleared the problem from being related to the utility this thread is for. No offense, but there are many threads that are tailored to problems like yours.

So, I feel the right thing to do, for you, is to move the problem to one or more of those other threads, give us a heads-up on where you've posted, and then this thread can get back on topic, while you can still get help, perhaps even better help than here.

Also, you may be being a bit impatient. As I've said, a cablecard in one-way mode, runs in slow boot mode, and you may not being giving it enough time to download ALL the data it needs before you force it to have to start all over again by all these things you are trying. Best of luck.

I have
1. The original stock drive that was used for about 6 months.
2. A WD20EURS created with JMFS. Currently in use with about 30% used.
3. A new WD20EURS.

How would you proceed?

Thank You

If it's easily accessible I'd pull the running WD20EURS, make a truncated backup, and keep the VHD file on your computer or restore it to the spare drive. You could also use Modified Full to keep the recordings, but in that case you'll need enough temp space on your computer to handle the image until you write it to the new drive (about 2.5GB + recordings).

You can do the same thing with the stock drive but you would have to restore the image to the new drive and use jmfs to expand it.

I'd probably use the truncated backup method, keep the backup file somewhere safe, and use the new WD20EURS for something else until you actually need it. Who couldn't use another 2TB for something?

Since it was expanded with WinMFS and drive A already has 15 partitions I can't think of any way to coalesce them into 1 drive at this time. If the total number of existing partitions for both drives was 16 or less it probably wouldn't take too much work to copy the Drive B partitions and modify a few places in the header, but that's not an option in this case.

None of that seems to matter. I've just spent the better part of a day trying to do that, and neither WinMFS nor MFSlive can do what they claim with regard to a dual drive 648 S3 with the original 250GB internal and 1TB external.

Despite what it says on the help pages, neither can combine two into one, and they cannot even copy dual drives to two new dual drives of the same size. WinMFS dumps out after drive selection in either scenario with "Error #1 - Unknown Error" (so helpful) and MFSlive went for 10 hours then dumped pages of errors followed by an "out of memory" message.

So my question for you is: can DvrBARS copy drive A, restore to a new drive of the same size, then copy drive B, restore to a new drive of the same size, and leave me with a working two drive system, all shows and settings intact?

And if that does work, any idea if it's possible to copy the original 250GB internal A drive, then restore it to a new 1TB, then use WinMFS to expand the A drive to full 1 TB size and still have it married to the B drive?

At this point I've given up on the merge idea because it seems unworkable, but I'd like to refresh the two drives in my 648 S3, and perhaps increase the capacity of the internal one.

DvrBARS will backup and restore at this time but does not do a drive to drive copy. For what you want to do use the full backup option on each drive. Then do a restore to the drive of your choice for each of the backups.

One thought that I have but have not played with yet to verify if it works on combining two drives into one is to first copy the main drive to a larger drive that is greater than the two drive setup. Then copy the first two partitions of the extender drive onto the extra space of the main drive. Physically add the information of those partitions to the APM. Go into the MFS superheader and change the references to the partitions to the external drive to the new partitions on the main drive. There are several places that this could fail. Nothing ventured nothing gained.

On another note, it may be possible to do as you mentioned. I have seen it done where you expanded the main drive then add an extender drive. Each step has to be done with WinMFS. You can expand an original image twice with WinMFS. The order is different but the expected result is the same.

__________________
"Delay is preferable to error" - Thomas Jefferson
"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants" - Sir Isaac Newton

On another note, it may be possible to do as you mentioned. I have seen it done where you expanded the main drive then add an extender drive. Each step has to be done with WinMFS. You can expand an original image twice with WinMFS. The order is different but the expected result is the same.

Once I have a set of working clones, I'm going to try restoring the A image to a larger drive and see if I can expand it.

Does it seem to you like I need both A and B drives connected for WinMFS to expand the A drive properly?

Or should I try it with just the A drive connected?

In the past, when I had only the A drive hooked up, WinMFS complained that I only had the A drive hooked up (knows there's a B drive somewhere).

I want to retain all my shows and settings, otherwise I'd just divorce the B drive, do a truncated backup of A, and dump a 2 TB drive in there .

Does it seem to you like I need both A and B drives connected for WinMFS to expand the A drive properly?

I want to retain all my shows and settings, otherwise I'd just divorce the B drive, do a truncated backup of A, and dump a 2 TB drive in there .

Usually we just transfer the shows to the PC then divorce the external, then do the backup/restore to new drive and transfer the shows back to the Tivo. But it cannot be done with protected recordings.

Usually we just transfer the shows to the PC then divorce the external, then do the backup/restore to new drive and transfer the shows back to the Tivo. But it cannot be done with protected recordings.

Yep, if I could do that, I would transfer them all to another S3 I have (much faster than to the PC), but I would lose about half my shows due to the stupid copy flag.

On an editorial note, it would be ridiculously simple for TiVo to implement a "move" function for those programs with the flag set, so that in the end only one copy still existed on the destination machine. This would honor the "do not copy" edict. I've suggested this to them in ten different ways over the last few years, and have been totally ignored. They are less end user concerned with each passing day.

As with social media sites, we are not the customers; we are the product TiVo sells to their customers, the advertisers.

Once I have a set of working clones, I'm going to try restoring the A image to a larger drive and see if I can expand it.

Does it seem to you like I need both A and B drives connected for WinMFS to expand the A drive properly?

Or should I try it with just the A drive connected?

In the past, when I had only the A drive hooked up, WinMFS complained that I only had the A drive hooked up (knows there's a B drive somewhere).

I want to retain all my shows and settings, otherwise I'd just divorce the B drive, do a truncated backup of A, and dump a 2 TB drive in there .

That's the rub that might prevent it from working. Both drives need to be connected since WinMFS has to be aware of the current setup when it does the expansion. I am afraid that if only drive A is connected it might erase references to drive B when it expands.

If you want to try my 2 to 1 idea PM me and will help you work through the details. Sounds harder than it is. Mostly time consuming with the copy process. No guarantees. Might be just a waste of time.

__________________
"Delay is preferable to error" - Thomas Jefferson
"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants" - Sir Isaac Newton

AFAIK the 2-1 function in WinMFS only works on S1 TiVos. DvrBARS can dupe any drive in the Full mode, and should work in Modified Full or Truncated mode as long as both drives are present during the backup stage.

Combining drives should be easy once I add MFS partition relocation / resizing, but that code is many months away. I think I know HOW to do it, but in programming terms I'm looking at the tip of Everest and haven't even made it to base camp or met the sherpas yet.

I hope this doesn't come across in the wrong way. I'm just trying to help the cause of the thread, by providing a source for some 2TB drives:

I just received a shipment of six WD20EADS-00S2B0 HARCHV2AA 2TB Western Digital hard drives, as replacements for some degraded/defective ones I sent back.

I'm curious how the drives have the same model number as the Caviar Green drives I sent back, but, instead have a black/white label, with no mention of Green, or Caviar (although the power & 32MB cache specs are the same), and the label doesn't specify the LBA of the drives (which I expect from AF drives, but EADS drives never were)...

To the point: I really don't need these drives for anything, since before I RMA'd the originals, I bought a case of WD20EURS drives to use for my TiVos, with a couple extra to shelf as spares.

Anyway, I have six 2TB WD20EADS drives (and more to come), which are still factory sealed, and this seemed like an appropriate place to say I'd be willing to part with them for a fair price, either to help the project, or help those looking to expand their capacity.

PM me with any reasonable offer(s). If I'm out of line, I'll retract this post.

It would be thoughtful if he pulled the text from his site which specifically states it will work on S3 boxes. I wasted a lot of time with that and MFSLive trying to make that work.

If you have a Dropbox account and enough space, put the full backups of both drives in a shared folder and send me an invite (same user name). I may be able to figure out something, and it would be a good way to get me back into the programming mode. Right now I'm in "watch TV & drink beer" mode.

I don't know that WinMFS can't do it from first hand experience, but someone else said that it couldn't in a recent thread and your experience seems to confirm it. It may even have worked until 11.0k was released with support for 2TB drives.

I recently got a new XL4 and ran a backup on the 2TB drive, before ever booting it up (creating a pristine image). I ran a full backup and after 6 hours of running, it created a small 1.6 GB backup file. Does this sound about right?

Silly me, I thought I would be playing with my new toy much sooner than that!

The one thing that surprised me was that the backup needs to be written to a formatted Windows drive. Makes sense now, but I was used to the dd type of copies and just assumed the same. Luckily, I had an online drive with enough space, in addition to the unformatted drive I was originally planning to copy to.

Also, when starting the utility, I do get an error message stating that the Drive A: is not ready. I don't have an A: drive. I simply said Continue and had no issues. It was easy to run. Thanks!

The 6 hours and 1.6gb backup for a full backup sounds correct. It reads every byte on the drive so it takes longer. dd in Linux would give you about the same time if you tried to copy the drive. Truncated backups are very quick as it reads only portions of the drive that are necessary. Usually in matter of minutes it will be completed. Modified will take longer as it depends on how many recordings you have. For a pristine drive, all three should be roughly the same size.
As far as the error message, ggieseke will have to comment on that.

__________________
"Delay is preferable to error" - Thomas Jefferson
"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants" - Sir Isaac Newton

I recently got a new XL4 and ran a backup on the 2TB drive, before ever booting it up (creating a pristine image). I ran a full backup and after 6 hours of running, it created a small 1.6 GB backup file. Does this sound about right?

Silly me, I thought I would be playing with my new toy much sooner than that!

The one thing that surprised me was that the backup needs to be written to a formatted Windows drive. Makes sense now, but I was used to the dd type of copies and just assumed the same. Luckily, I had an online drive with enough space, in addition to the unformatted drive I was originally planning to copy to.

Also, when starting the utility, I do get an error message stating that the Drive A: is not ready. I don't have an A: drive. I simply said Continue and had no issues. It was easy to run. Thanks!

6 hours sounds about right for a 2TB drive in Full mode, and about 1.6GB is the same as my XL4 image. Full backups read every byte on the drive and count on there being lots of 2MB chunks of all zeros for compression.

A Modified Full or Truncated backup of a factory drive should give the same results in a few minutes.

Not sure about the A: drive message, maybe it's something in your BIOS settings or an SD card reader. I've patched around most of the unusual drive configurations that it has encountered so far, but I still like to pop up error messages so that I know something is odd. As long as it continues and doesn't kill the main program that's how it should work.